Shafaghi, Bita

Welin, Helen

Abstract [en]

Dynek Sutures Pty. Ltd., an Australian owned company, assembles surgical needles and sutures. To meet customer expectations about quality and price and to compete with other manufacturer, Dynek has to improve their production rate and quality and lower their costs. One way of doing this is to invest in an automatic assembly machine. At present there are no available machines to purchase. This report concerns the development and design of one part of the assembly machine, the needle feeder. It also includes the aim and objectives, the methods and reasons for choosing them, results and conclusions. The aim of this thesis is to develop and design a needle feeder that can be integrated in the assembly machine. The objective for the thesis is to develop and design a needle feeder that can be integrated in the machine without any disturbances, to obtain a machine that is more effective than manual operations and that assembles the needles with a higher quality than before. To get a deeper understanding of the assembly that takes place at Dynek, the process is observed and discussed. Concepts have been raised and presented to Dynek. When the overall view is reached of what is needed for the assignment, one of the parts is further examined: the needle feeder and a needle fixture. Research,experiments, brainstorming and discussions with several persons led the way to a final proposal for the assignment. The proposal consists of A vibratory feeder (to sort the needles out and orient them) An escapement (to lead the needles out from the feeder) A fixture (to lead the needles to the assembling area) This machine involves a high capital investment, which can lead to some liquidity concerns. The amount of money that Dynek can save due to reduced salary costs is one of the major arguments when discussing economy. Today, 14 persons are working in the assembly. With a machine, this number can be reduced significantly.